Internet censorship is a subject of growing concern around the world.
While the goals of many censorship advocates are often worthy, the "cure" is
sometimes worse than the disease. A particularly troubling trend has been the
emergence of government efforts to block IP addresses. The World Future
Fund strongly agrees that we, as a planet, should combat racial and religious
intolerance and other evils. However, adopting totalitarian political
tactics is a very dangerous solution. We feel the key is education, not
censorship. We have developed a project that specifically encourages
tolerance by means of education and links to groups working for religious
tolerance. Click here to see our Global
Education Project about World Religion, Philosophy, and History

The World Future Fund has created this brief report on the issue of Internet
censorship in order to provide basic information about web censorship practices
in China, Germany, France, and the United States. Users please note that
this report is only an introduction. It is not a comprehensive overview of
the subject all around the world. However, we feel it is a very important
document. When democratically-elected politicians in the United States and
Germany start to emulate the actions of a totalitarian government in China, we
believe there is reason for concern.

The number of cases in which local, state, and national governments have
attempted to block access to web sites containing "offensive" material has risen
in recent years. The practice of blocking access to web sites has taken
place in Europe, Asia, and in North America, regardless of whether or not the
government of that country is authoritarian or democratic in nature.
Central to the issue is the fact that efforts have been made to block sites
that are based beyond the borders of the countries in question.

The People's Republic of China probably has the
most massive and comprehensive campaign of internet censorship in the world,
particularly when it comes to block Internet IP addresses. According to
one recent report from the organization Reporters Without Frontiers (see
"Living Dangerously on
the Net"), the Chinese government employs as many as 30,000 people to police
Internet providers in China. Other reports below make it clear that on a
regular basis the Chinese government restricts access to tens of thousands of
web sites. This number is constantly on the rise.

According to this report "tests from May 2002
through November 2002 indicate at least four distinct and independently operable
methods of Internet filtering, with a documentable leap in filtering
sophistication beginning in September 2002. The authors document thousands of
sites rendered inaccessible using the most common and longstanding filtering
practice. These sites were found through connections to the Internet by
telephone dial-up link and through proxy servers in China. Once so connected,
the authors attempted to access approximately two hundred thousand web sites.
The authors tracked 19,032 web sites that were inaccessible from China on
multiple occasions while remaining accessible from the United States. Such sites
contained information about news, politics, health, commerce, and entertainment.
The authors conclude (1) that the Chinese government maintains an active
interest in preventing users from viewing certain web content, both sexually
explicit and non-sexually explicit; (2) that it has managed to configure
overlapping nationwide systems to effectively -- if at times irregularly --
block such content from users who do not regularly seek to circumvent such
blocking; and (3) that such blocking systems are becoming more refined even as
they are likely more labor and technology intensive to maintain than cruder
predecessors."

A detailed report on the government crackdown on
Internet access and use. The article lists statistics on the numbers and
types of web sites blocked by the Chinese government, including the blocking of
"more
than 50,000 out of 204,000 websites normally accessible through the Google and
Yahoo search-engines" and "the websites of 923 media, including the BBC, CNN and
Time magazine ... along with the sites of governments, such as Taiwan."

According to "Section 2: Respect for Civil
Liberties" of this report, since 1997, the Chinese government has ordered
corporate and individual Internet access providers to register their servers
with a special technology monitoring section of the state secret police.
The police regularly monitor Internet access and usage by Chinese citizens via
these networks. Raids are frequently staged on unregistered servers,
particularly those used by cyber cafés where many Chinese access the World Wide
Web. The range of web sites blocked by the state government runs from
pornography sites, to pro-democracy political sites. Email is also subject
to government surveillance.

State and regional authorities in Germany regularly police Internet sites
that carry political content the authorities consider offensive. The
case in North Rhine-Westphalia (described below) marked the beginning of a
concerted effort by authorities on a regional level to block the Internet IP
addresses of web sites containing racist, xenophobic and Nazi-related materials.
Efforts are currently being made to expand these blocking practices from a
regional to a national level.

In January and February 2002, civil authorities in the District of Düsseldorf
(Bezirksregierung
Düsseldorf), under the direction of District President J

ürgen
Büssow
(a representative of the ruling SPD), ordered 76 privately owned and
school-based internet providers in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia
(Nordrhein-Westfalen) to block access to two web sites that contain Nazi
propaganda, hate speech, and racist tracts. Two web sites located in the
United States:
www.nazi-lauck-nsdapao.com and www.stormfront.org, were
specifically targeted by the ban. However, according to one German
Internet-rights group, the Förderverein
Informationstechnik und Gesellschaft (Fitug e.V.),
the list of hate-speech sites that could potentially be blocked is close to
3,000 (See the English language page of
Fitug e.V.).
According to the German authorities involved, the content of the two web sites
immediately in question violated sections of Germany's Constitution (Grundgesetz),
the State Criminal Code (Strafgesetzbuch)
and Paragraphs 8 and 18 of the Interstate Agreement on Media Service Providers (Staatsvertrag
über Mediendienste), which prohibit the dissemination of Nazi, racist, and
hate propaganda in Germany.

The action by the District of Düsseldorf was challenged in several district
courts (Verwaltungsgerichten) in Nordrhein-Westfalen by a group of concerned
media and Internet-rights groups in Germany (Click here for a list of these
groups:
www.David-Gegen-Goliath.org) on grounds that the order to block the sites
violated Article 5 of the German Constitution guaranteeing the free exchange of
information in German society. The district courts involved ( the
Verwaltungsgerichten Cologne, Minden, Arnsburg, Düsseldorf, Aachen, and
Gelsenkirchen) reached contradictory decisions, with some upholding the order
and others striking it down. These decisions have been posted online and
can be accessed here:
Decisions of German Courts Concerning Right-Wing Extremism on the Internet.

The lack of a definitive legal decision led the Higher Administrative Court
for North Rhine-Westphalia located in M

ünster
(Oberverwaltungsgericht Münster) to take up
the case (Case Number Az.: 8 B 2567/02). In March 2003, the Münster
court upheld the actions of the district authorities in Düsseldorf (For the
court's official press release on the decision see
Press Release on
Right-Wing Web Site Decisionin German).
The Münster court's decision was based on the fact that "Both of the Internet
sites contain illegal content that is punishable in the sense outlined in the
Interstate Agreement on Media Service Providers." (See
Staatsvertrag über
Mediendienste, for paragraphs 8 and 18 to which the court referred.)
Six copies of the decision (dated from March 19, 2003 to March 25, 2003) are
posted on
Decisions of German Courts Concerning Right-Wing Extremism on the Internet
because a separate decision had to be created to address the decisions of the
six subordinate district courts listed above: Cologne, Minden, Arnsburg,
Düsseldorf, Aachen, and Gelsenkirchen.

As a result of the Münster court's decision, 76 Internet providers in North
Rhine-Westphalia were ordered to block the two sites in question. The
documents pertaining to the M

ünster
is being appealed to the German Supreme Court by Internet-rights groups that
originally opposed the ban. It could, however, take as long as a decade before
the case can be heard by the German Supreme Court. In the meantime,
Jürgen Büssow, the initiator of the ban in North Rhine-Westphalia, has once
again taken the initiative and is heading an effort to expand the ban
nationally.

Fitug is an association of individuals and organizations founded in 1996
whose goal is to "promote the integration of new media forms into German
society, as well as to provide information on the risks and dangers associated
with these media." The association is concerned with a diverse number of
issues, including the protection of human rights on the Internet and web-based
criminal activity.

ODEM is a non-profit organization concerned with the protection of basic
human rights on a free and unregulated Internet. The organization
coordinates projects and groups seeking to protect the unregulated Internet and
to protect the Internet's growing role as a place for political expression.

The Network for New Media is a "digital civil rights organization the aim of
which is to promote public discussion about the socio-political aspects of new
media (like the Internet) and to strengthen and critically examine those media.

The CCC is an association seeking to promote the free exchange of
information. It is concerned with the effects of technology on society.
The CCC supports the protection of human rights world wide and unregulated
communication between all the peoples of the world.

The BBA is a watchdog group related to the Association for the Promotion of
Public and Unregulated Data Exchange (FoeBuD
e.V.). Since 1998 the BBA has promoted open discussion about and the
protection of personal information on the Internet.

The Virtual Local Association of the Social Democratic Party is a group
concerned with the "social and economic effects of information and communication
technologies and the consequences of these for members of the Social Democratic
Party."

Quintessenz is an E-magazine published by an
association of individuals from technical, scientific, journalistic and artistic
fields. Since 1994 Quintessenz has been active in examining "governmental
and private sector surveillance overkill and new data retention law proposals by
the EU, the Council of Europe or the so called G7 states that undermine
fundamental rights: freedom of information, the right to personal privacy and
data integrity, the right to communicate freely."

In early 2002, the Attorney General of Pennsylvania began issuing orders
to ISP's to block the IP
addresses of hundreds of web sites. The blocking efforts were based on
a new Pennsylvania law which stated that Internet Service Providers could be held liable for
child pornography that is available on the Internet, even if the provider is
not the publisher of the offending content. In effect, "the law stated
that any ISP doing business in Pennsylvania was potentially liable for content
posted anywhere on the Internet".

The internet blocking legislation was
challenged in court by the Center for Democracy and Technology and the ACLU of
Pennsylvania on the grounds that it "violated the constitutional principles of
free speech and due process." As a result of the case brought by the CDT
and ACLU, the
Pennsylvania
Attorney General has agreed temporarily to halt the censorship until the
legality of the law is revolved in a case that should be finished this year.

According to a study conducted by The Berkman Center for Internet & Society
at Harvard Law School, the search engine Google practices self-censorship in
countries where its search engine may display hits for sites whose content is
banned by national laws. The study compared the results of searches on
Google.fr and Google.de vs. searches conducted on Google.com. The results
were telling, with some 113 sites excluded from Google.fr and Google.de that
were not excluded from similar searches on Google.com. After the Second
World War, both France and Germany adopted laws and placed provisions into their
constitutions that prohibit the dissemination of hate speech, Nazi propaganda,
and racist and xenophobic materials. Some types of pornography (e.g.,
child pornography) are also banned under these laws. Google does not make
it clear if its censorship of the 113 sites in question was requested by the
governments of France or Germany. The authors of the Harvard study
conclude therefore that Google likely censored its search engines in these
countries on its own initiative.

In spring 2000, two groups in France sued Yahoo! to stop Nazi memorabilia
from being sold on its auction sites. The groups claimed that allowing
people in France to purchase Nazi memorabilia on Yahoo! auction sites violated
the country's anti-hate speech laws. A French judge ruled in favor of the
groups and ordered that Yahoo!, an Internet service provider located in the
United States, must block users of Yahoo! France (Yahoo.fr) from being able to
see or purchase Nazi memorabilia that is available via online auctions.
Yahoo! argued that French courts have no jurisdiction over its operations, which
are located in the United States. However, Yahoo! voluntarily complied
with the court order.

The Yahoo case is generally considered to have been the first significant
attempt by the judiciary in one country to regulate the content of an Internet
site located in another country. Yahoo! continued to fight the French
court's decision in U.S. courts. As of February 2003 U.S. courts and a
court in Paris had overturned the earlier court ordered ban.